Would "type two" make us happier? It can feel terrible while you’re doing it but, when it is over, your memory erases the miserable parts and you would do it again and again.
Millions are having the wrong sort of fun
Would "type two" make us happier? It can feel terrible while you're doing it but, when it is over, your memory erases the miserable parts and you would do it again and again.
Courtney Dauwalter had run 309 miles along the ColoradoA state in the west of the US that contains much of the Rocky Mountains. Trail when she collapsed. The ultramarathonerSomeone who runs races which are longer than a marathon. was trying to break the record for the mountainous 490-mile trail, which climbs from 5,500 to 13,271 feet. Instead, she ended up in hospital suffering from bronchitisA lung disease that causes coughing.. But she insists that she does not regret it.
"I loved it a lot," she said afterwards. "I ended up having to stop for health reasons, and that wasn't ideal, but it didn't push it into type three fun for me because I had a great support system around me."
Dauwalter was using a term that has become common among people who take part in extreme sports. Type one fun is an activity you expect to enjoy and do, like going to a birthday party.
Type two is something that you only enjoy in retrospectLooking back on something.. The climber Kelly Cordes gives a classic example: climbing Mount Huntington in Alaska with his friend Scott. "The final thousand feet was horrifying - steep sugar snowSnow that quickly turns to slush. that collapsed beneath our feet as we battled upward, unable to down-climb, and unable to find protection or anchors. On the summit, with the immaculate expanse of the range unfolding in every direction, Scott turned to me and said, in complete seriousness, 'I want my mom so bad right now'".
But before long, Scott had changed his tune. "You know, that wasn't so bad," he said. "What should we try next year?"
Type three is not actually fun at all. "It's often described as 'harrowing'," writes Erin Strout in The Washington Post, "like getting dangerously lost in the wilderness or trying to swim across the Atlantic. It often involves search-and-rescue, prayers and vows that you'll never do it again."
As Courtney Dauwalter acknowledged, her run could easily have come into this category. But because her support team was able to get her to hospital, it became type two fun: she was able to look back on it with pleasure - once she had recovered.
The appeal of type two, Erin Strout explains, is that "it challenges you without putting you in danger - and it's often uncomfortable but in ways that also make you feel alive."
Whether type two can really be described as fun is hotly debated. According to psychologist Travis Tae Oh, the essential elements of fun are "hedonicTo do with pleasure. engagement" - doing something for sheer enjoyment - and "a sense of liberation". That means temporarily freeing yourself from everyday anxieties.
Something you only enjoy afterwards, he says, definitely does not meet this definition.
But another psychologist, Michael Rucker, is more open to the idea. He has devised a "fun type calculator" which works out what kind of fun appeals to different people.
He uses the term "hard fun" for something that "challenges the things we believe or connects us to something bigger - gets us out of our heads so that our micro-problems feel smaller".
As for type three, though, he calls that "agonising... I don't know why you would want to engage in type three fun".
Would "type two" make us happier?
Yes: Type one fun is great while it lasts, but does nothing to develop you as a person. Meeting the challenges of type two makes us more resourceful and better equipped to get the most out of life.
No: Type two fun is like banging your head against a brick wall - the only good thing about it is the relief of stopping. Extreme activities can very easily go wrong and make your life miserable.
Or... Everyone's sense of enjoyment is different, so you cannot narrow fun down to just three types. The most fulfilling lives contain a mixture of sheer enjoyment and deeply challenging experiences.
Keywords
Colorado - A state in the west of the US that contains much of the Rocky Mountains.
Ultramarathoner - Someone who runs races which are longer than a marathon.
Bronchitis - A lung disease that causes coughing.
Retrospect - Looking back on something.
Sugar snow - Snow that quickly turns to slush.
Hedonic - To do with pleasure.
Millions are having the wrong sort of fun
Glossary
Colorado - A state in the west of the US that contains much of the Rocky Mountains.
Ultramarathoner - Someone who runs races which are longer than a marathon.
Bronchitis - A lung disease that causes coughing.
Retrospect - Looking back on something.
Sugar snow - Snow that quickly turns to slush.
Hedonic - To do with pleasure.